Four steel rims glistened brightly in the harsh noon day sun, glaring like beacons of warning, cold glints of sparkle in the relentless heat that shimmered and danced in a frenzied intensity of sweat, dissonance and pure, utter feeling. Like pillars of an ancient temple, they stood unwavering, carrying the weight, on their shoulders; uncomplaining; of steel and leather and tinted glass, an expression of finality and unadulterated technique, the soul lost in the myriad complexities of dials and fabric and smooth, seamless, rivetless joints, a temple of modernity, devoted ceaselessly to efficiency, unending valleys and chasms of sinuous, flowing lines etched like diamond facets into the ridges and curves of futuristic, space-age alloys. A paean to avarice and hedonism and decadence and madness.

A rumble like the growling of wildcats vibrated through the steel and passed along the ground and shook the dust and grass and slowly crept into the realms of subsonic; an inaudible, ominous thing, unaware of its own electricity and dangerously inching towards its potential. It moved, with a grace and speed incomprehensible to the heretic, a blinding blur that left dust and smoke and black rubber trails squealing onto submissive asphalt receivers; the viscera a seamless, efficient machination; the world its end. The whole was a thing of magnificence that eclipsed the landscape, rendering all the other indistinguishable landmarks(trees, rivers, the sky)obsolete and uninteresting. It was alien, distant, unattainable and exquisite. A menacing, indomitable speed deity and the roads were its pagan devotees, laying bare their secrets and innermost heart to it, as its wheels turned and grinded across their surface, turning relentlessly until streaks and smoke spewed, a dragon machine, a hurtling missile that belied a safe, warm center, a center calm and unflinchingly cool, so expertly suave, so clear and precise in its actions.

And its majesty traversed the earth, taking in the skies and the trees as its subjects, pulling them along in a maddening rush, until the planet itself was sucked into its center, helpless to resist this god of thrust, this machine that smiled, catlike, purring in its heart. Distorted, twisted horizons floated in the distance, eternally out of reach, taunting and mocking like crazed, lunatic simians, a hopelessly precious prize dancing in the smouldering heat. Still it pressed unceasingly forward; driven by demons whose names had been forgotten by history, by ancient lusts buried under shopping malls and skyscrapers and concrete and asphalt and tar. Its wheels of rubber and steel tearing away and stripping the glass windows of the malls and the concrete of the skyscrapers. Leaving the earth a husk, embittered by a spiteful, vengeful speed that swallowed the waves and the sea and the sand.

Beyond reproach now, a supreme being out of control, out of touch; its lines melted into colours that flew away into the onrushing wind, it was now pure. An abstract thing; transcending form and substance, reaching a plateau of untainted feeling, an undying rush, a perpetual nomad; intangible but not capable of insubstantiality, a truth beating in the hearts of believers, immortalized and suffused with faith and belief that strengthened it and cast it into the heavens. It took flight in its soul and its soul bared wings of silver and gossamer steel, oiled and silken smooth, lifting itself gently on chiming winds that spoke quiet, encouraging whispers and blew away the roads and the harried unbelievers that scattered; a beacon for the faithful; enlightened steel and leather; restless, swift soul.

Pae"an (?), n. [L. paean, Gr. , fr. the physician of the gods, later, Apollo. Cf. Paeon, Peony.] [Written also pean.]

1.

An ancient Greek hymn in honor of Apollo as a healing deity, and, later, a song addressed to other deities.

2.

Any loud and joyous song; a song of triumph.

Dryden. "Public paeans of congratulation."

De Quincey.

3.

See Paeon.

 

© Webster 1913.

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